Homemade Multigrain Cereal -- The Thursday Constancy, Made Visible

Sven the Second is two years old now and the most enthusiastic dog Duluth has ever produced. He cannot replace the first Sven. He does not need to. He is doing his own job — the puppy job, the joyful job, the job of taking the kitchen seriously and the squirrels in the yard much more seriously than that. He is the right dog for this period of the kitchen's life. Jakob got engaged. To a woman named Claire. They are both teachers. Jakob is twenty-eight. The wedding is in spring. I will bake the cake. The princess cake. The sacred cake. The cake of every Johansson wedding since I made it for my own wedding to Paul in 1988. I am sixty-something and I am still baking the cake. I will bake the cake at every Johansson wedding for as long as the hands work. Lena moved to Bozeman, Montana. She is a wildlife biologist now. She sends photos of bears. The photos are on the fridge. I worry. I do not say. The worry is the standard grandmotherly worry — bears, weather, men, distance. Lena is fine. Lena has always been fine. Lena is the most self-sufficient grandchild I have, and the most distant, and the one I worry about specifically because of both of those things. I cooked Wild rice soup this week. The Thursday constant. Thursday: soup. Always soup. Gerald said, "You are the most reliable woman in Duluth." I said, "I am the most reliable woman in this kitchen." He said, "Same thing." I do not think that is the same thing. I think that is a kindness Gerald gives me because Gerald is kind. I take the kindness. I do not argue. I lit a candle in the kitchen for no particular reason. Maybe for Mamma. Maybe for Pappa. Maybe for Lars. Maybe for Paul. Maybe for all of them. The candle is a tall white tapered one, set in a brass holder Mamma had on her dining room table for forty years. I let it burn down. The dripping wax made a small white pool on the brass. I cleaned it off. I lit another one the next night. It is enough. It has to be. And on a morning like this, with the lake doing what the lake does and the dog at my feet and the bread on the counter and the kitchen warm enough to live in, it is. I have learned, slowly, that there is a kind of competence that comes only with age. Not wisdom, exactly — wisdom is a word too grand for what I mean. Competence. The competence of having watched many things go wrong and many things go right and having developed an internal database of which is which. The competence is, perhaps, the only thing that improves with age in a body that is otherwise declining. I will take the trade. The Damiano Center has changed slowly over the years. The director has changed three times in the period I have volunteered. The volunteer roster has rotated, with new faces every year. The pot — the actual physical fifty-gallon stock pot — has been replaced once. The recipe has not changed. The recipe is a constant. The constancy is the gift the recipe gives to a place where so much else is in flux. It is enough.

Gerald calls me reliable. I call it practice — decades of mornings built on the same small anchors, the same warm things, the same kitchen doing its quiet work. The wild rice soup is Thursday’s anchor, yes, but mornings have their own. This homemade multigrain cereal is the kind of recipe that belongs to a kitchen like mine: unpretentious, nourishing, made from things that keep. It is not glamorous. It is better than glamorous. It is the thing you make when you want to feel like the day is already, before it has really started, going to be all right.

Homemade Multigrain Cereal

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 20 minutes | Total Time: 30 minutes | Servings: 6

Ingredients

• 1 cup rolled oats
• 1/2 cup rolled rye flakes
• 1/2 cup rolled barley flakes
• 1/4 cup millet
• 1/4 cup flaxseed meal
• 1/4 cup sunflower seeds
• 2 tablespoons sesame seeds
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 4 cups water (per 1 cup dry cereal blend)
• Honey, brown sugar, or maple syrup, to serve
• Whole milk, cream, or your preferred milk, to serve
• Fresh or dried fruit, to serve (optional)

Instructions

1. Combine the dry grains. In a large bowl, stir together the rolled oats, rye flakes, barley flakes, millet, flaxseed meal, sunflower seeds, and sesame seeds until evenly mixed. Store in an airtight jar or container — the blend keeps at room temperature for up to one month.
2. Measure your portion. For each serving, measure out 1/3 cup of the dry multigrain blend. Scale up as needed for the number of people at the table.
3. Bring water to a boil. In a medium saucepan, bring the water to a rolling boil over medium-high heat. Use a ratio of roughly 1 cup dry cereal to 4 cups water, adjusting for your preferred consistency.
4. Cook the cereal. Stir in the dry cereal blend and the sea salt. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook, stirring occasionally, for 15 to 20 minutes, until the grains have absorbed most of the water and the cereal is thick and tender. The millet will give it a pleasant, slightly nutty bite.
5. Rest and serve. Remove from heat and let stand for 2 minutes — it will thicken slightly as it rests. Spoon into bowls and serve with a drizzle of honey or maple syrup, a pour of milk or cream, and fruit if you like. A pinch of cinnamon or cardamom is welcome on a cold Duluth morning.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 210 | Protein: 7g | Fat: 7g | Carbs: 31g | Fiber: 6g | Sodium: 160mg